Introduction 1
Home cooking
Craving content: Or, the unsubtle art of selling a recipe 13
On the seventh day, they cooked: Or, how newspaper supplements invented British foodies 28
Allrecipes: Or, the chaotic recipes of the realist's internet 43
Tastemakers
The critic hits the road: Or, real influencers and where to find them 61
Anatomy of a queue: Or, the pleasures and pitfalls of hype restaurants 86
I like bubble tea: Or, the cultural ingredients of a global mega-trend 99
Everything but the recipe
Dream home: Or, fantasy and feeding, from magazines to Instagram 123
How not to use a cookbook: Or, the power and limits of writing about food 145
'Cook remaining 100 lobsters': Or, the modern cook's guide to entertaining 173
Impulse buy
Supermarket fugue: Or, an experiential history of four superstores 189
The ice cream age: Or, how to invent a hit ice cream 205
Tonic waters: Or, the rise and rise of the magic wellness drink 224
Fast food
The automat is dead: Or, on the past and future lives of food machines 237
Wimpy: Or, the good, the bad and the ugly of British American food 253
Epilogue 271
Further Reading 277
Acknowledgements 291